Protecting the emperor penguin: what the Antarctic Treaty can actually do

The Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting (ATCM) held in Hiroshima, Japan over recent days has failed again to designate the emperor penguin – the largest penguin species that only exists in Antarctica – as a “Specially Protected Species”.

The proposal was first put forward at the ATCM held in Berlin in 2022, and has been reintroduced at every meeting since, but remains unresolved. The primary causes of the decline in emperor penguin populations have been well documented: habitat changes resulting from global climate change, a crisis caused by human activities occurring primarily outside Antarctica. Despite overwhelming scientific evidence, the ATCM has repeatedly failed to reach a consensus on this designation due to objections from one or two countries. The primary basis for opposition is that the Antarctic Treaty System (ATS) lacks the mandate to mitigate the threats posed by global climate change.

For years, discussions have remained stuck in this impasse.

A major development in 2026 was the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) decision in April to classify the emperor penguin as “Endangered”, upgrading its conservation status on the Red List by two categories from “Near Threatened” – a move that strengthened calls for enhanced protection.

However, a fundamental question remains: for species facing primary threats to their existence originating outside the jurisdiction of the ATS, what practical measures can the system actually take to ensure the special protection of emperor penguins? And why should it care?

Three good reasons can be drawn from the substance and nature of the designation of Antarctic Specially Protected Species, as well as from the objectives and principles of the Environmental Protocol to the Antarctic Treaty.

First, within the Antarctic Treaty System, designating a species as specially protected not only acknowledges its threatened status and the need to be safeguarded, but also entails specific conservation actions. The initial protection offered by the provisions of Annex II of the Protocol is restrictions on harvesting. The guidelines require that a draft action plan for protection be attached to the proposal. Once a proposal is adopted, the action plan is expected to be implemented.

The 2022 Emperor penguin proposal included both on-site access restrictions and an action plan to introduce additional protected areas and coordinate with other mechanisms to further advance protection. The designation of Specially Protected Species is therefore merely a starting point.

Second, climate change adaptation is as important as emissions reduction. As climate change is already underway, human societies need to manage the risks it poses. The same rationale applies to the conservation of nature. While climate change may push management outcomes away from the original conservation goals, reducing other stressors can protect the ecosystem’s resilience to that pressure. The designation of the emperor penguin as a specially protected species is based on this rationale. Its action plan aims to reduce on-site stressors within the ATS’s management mandate. With full implementation, it can give some emperor penguins a better chance of enduring the challenges posed by climate change.

Third, conservation of Antarctic species requires extra precaution, as it must serve the agreed management objective of the continent: to keep the region's physical, chemical, geological, and ecological status as stable as possible. The Protocol on Environmental Protection designates Antarctica as a “natural reserve”, preserving its function as a natural laboratory for scientific research. In addition, the environmental protection principles of the Protocol (Article III) explicitly state that Antarctica’s “intrinsic value” must also be protected. While environmental protection elsewhere is often framed in terms of human use, protecting Antarctica’s intrinsic value means protecting it for its own sake.

This implies that the drive behind the protection actions is not based on necessity, but rather on a willingness to protect. There is no need to prove human use benefits to justify such protection. Although ecological conservation generally requires the application of the precautionary approach, the legal basis for such application in Antarctica is the principle enshrined in the Protocol on Environmental Protection.

In short, designating the emperor penguin as a specially protected species is a starting point for international cooperation to help them adapt to climate change. The ATS is mandated by the Environmental Protocol to do so. The reluctance of the two parties to such a designation may indicate their rejection of the reasons above or their unwillingness to initiate such cooperation.

Nonetheless, the objection should not prevent other parties to the ATS from beginning to cooperate on the actions listed in the proposed action plan. The information exchange, compilation of scientific evidence, and protected area design do not need consensus to proceed. This is an opportunity for the middle powers to respond to the call by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney to build what they claim to believe in, create institutions and agreements that function as described, and reduce the power of vetoes.